The article is from the "Blue and White Club Game Encyclopedia" (id: qinghua_game), by Li Honggui
As long as it is a game, as small as "Snake", as large as "Total War", including the real "throwing handkerchief" has its rules. Chaos will be caused by no rules, players will not only be unable to experience the game normally, but will not even know where to start, so the rules are even included in the "basic components of the game" by some scholars. In the previous hit movie "Ready Player One", the old designer James Halliday claimed that he "hated the rules", but on the other hand, whether it was choosing to drive in the opposite direction in the racing race, or later needing to play the old game on the old game console to get the reward, all this is actually the rule designed by Halliday, if there is no rule, then the way to get the reward will be more imaginative, rather than following the conditions set by the system.
The rules in the game seem complex, but in fact, many of them are based on some "basic rules", today we want to discuss the basic rules of the game that need to be stipulated in general electronic and computer games, many of which are not parallel and independent, and there will inevitably be interspersed in the middle.
1. Death rules
The game's "death rule" dictates how to determine the termination of a game process, which is what we usually call "game over". In the early games such as Contra (first released on the Jamma arcade platform) and Sharoman Snake (the earliest platform was ac arcade), there was no "health" setting, and the player-controlled villain or small spaceship would die as soon as it was hit by a bullet screen. However, due to the fact that the game industry was not yet developed at that time, the alternative products that players could choose were very rare, so the sense of achievement of the game clearance was overcome by the frustration of game over, and everyone was still addicted to it, but this kind of "hit is dead" death judgment rule will definitely make most players prohibitive now.
Later, in the era of PCs and home consoles, a large number of games began to use the concept of "health", and the more classic examples are "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" first released on the fc platform in 1989 and "fps originator" "Wehrmacht Headquarters 3d" in 1993.
For many domestic players, the fc version of "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" In addition to the protagonist is the popular 4 brothers, the biggest surprise is "blood more", which even became the first fc game I played through, "ShaRoman Snake", "Contra", "Tinker Bell" and other death rules are too strict, can be stuck in the first 4 levels, can only say "can't fight, is really not able to fight". Game death rules based on "health" are still mainstream in contemporary times, especially multiplayer competitive games (that is, "pvp games"), when we try to use general attacks, skills, props, etc. to make the enemy's health points deducted to 0 points, they will enter the "death state", in the same way, the life of the characters we control will also die when they are deducted to 0 points, although on the surface the passive "Ice Crystal Phoenix" can give it a chance to respawn when it has 0 health points. But the egg change mechanism you can fully see as giving the phoenix some extra health, the egg is broken health value really zero, the phoenix is still difficult to escape a death, similar mechanism skills there are many more, here will not be repeated.
After death, the game usually gives you a "game over" screen, the significance of this screen is to prompt the player that the previous game process has been temporarily over, and ended in failure, the goal of the game settings is not completed, you need to start the game from the previous "checkpoint", such as "Counter-Strike" After the player dies, the player can switch to the perspective of teammates to watch the battle, and at the beginning of the next game, they will get a new life at their respective spawn points; lol is to become a "black and white screen", After a period of resurrection time, it will be reborn at the spring; the "game over screen" of the wolf has recently been changed by players in many hilarious versions, like the following...
But the "game over screen" usually does not make a long, grinding animation, otherwise the player will have a period of sitting and waiting, and if the player dies slightly more often, they will see it again and again, which is very affecting the experience, generally speaking, after the player dies, the shorter the process of starting over, the better.
Of course, there are also many stand-alone games that have begun to abandon the game setting of "killing the protagonist", such as the protagonist in "Prince of Persia 4" if the protagonist accidentally falls into the abyss, the heroine Erica will pull him back to a safe position, eliminating the process of "game over-screen", and can allow players to quickly return to the game.
In Batman: Arkham Asylum, players also have the opportunity to turn the tide through qte operations before Batman falls to his death, and if the player succeeds, Batman can return to safety. This way is getting more and more games in use, and resetting players to a recent checkpoint in the level allows them to keep starting new attempts until they succeed, which also helps to eliminate frustration among players.
In addition, many time-limited missions will use time as the player's "second health", assuming that you cannot complete the specified game objectives within the time limit, then it will also be judged as game over.
Second, the numerical rules
Almost all games are inseparable from the "value", "how much length can the snake increase with each bean eaten", "what is the base damage of the Death Song Move", "the duration of the Black Emperor's staff should be a few seconds", "how much Xanado's special attack growth should be" This is a matter of value. Bad numerical rules lead to a bad gaming experience, such as the early days of dota, when the Black Emperor Staff lasted 10 seconds per use, and almost all matches used a "3-on-2" or "4-on-1" lineup.
In a nutshell, games with combat elements can be simply and crudely divided into 3 categories – attack, defense, and maneuver. The attack value represents how much the character can reduce the health of the target; the defense value represents how much health reduction can be offset from the opponent's attack, and the health value also belongs to the category of defense value, which represents how much attack can be tolerated. Around the attack and defense, each game can be said to do everything in their power to make a fuss about it. A simple point is that "physical attack" corresponds to "physical defense", "magic attack" corresponds to the two-line mechanism of "magic defense", and the more complicated point is to subdivide the attack type into different attributes such as "flame", "frost", "shadow", "sacred" and so on, corresponding to "flame resistance", "frost resistance", "shadow resistance" and "sacred resistance".
For different game types, the numerical rules for attack and defense attributes are also very different. For example, in multiplayer moba games, the benefits of the defender in the early game stage will be greater, such as the defense tower has a high base damage and a high base health, and the production cost of the armor is generally lower than that of the attack suit. This is because in the early stage must increase the offensive cost and risk of the offensive side, the passive side of the defensive cost must be relatively low, if the early attack molding speed is faster than the defensive armor, and the defense tower output is low and very fragile, then it is easy to cause the boring play of the two sides of the battle to push each other, in order to make the game more fun and ornamental, and to control the length of each game within a reasonable range, it is necessary to increase the risk of the early attacker; and in the later stage, in order to avoid the situation of counterattack such as brainless turtle shrinkage, It is necessary to weaken the advantage of the defender, which also answers many players' questions about "why not increase the amount of blood in the second tower, the highland tower, and the front tooth tower".
As for the numerical value of the maneuver, this is also an attribute that has different performances in different games. In moba, action, real-time strategy and other games, it is manifested as the movement speed of the character, which usually includes the regular movement state, acceleration and deceleration state, and displacement and transmission, such as how fast a unit moves at ordinary times; whether there is an acceleration skill, whether the acceleration skill lasts permanently or for a period of time, how long is the duration; whether there is a displacement skill, what is the distance and cooldown time of the displacement skill; the teleportation is actually a displacement skill, but generally speaking, the distance of the teleportation skill is farther than the displacement. If displacement is a combat skill, teleportation is a strategic skill. Maneuvering skills often indirectly affect both attack and defense dimensions, such as units with displacements that can quickly cut in can attack several times in the same time, or can use flexible characteristics to dodge some attacks, thus playing a defensive effect. The numerical values of these skills and units are the most difficult to plan, as players tend to display staggering upper limits on these units. In other different kinds of games, the performance of "maneuvering" is also very different, such as the traditional RPG "Regulus Sword 3: The Other End of the Cloud and the Mountain" has adopted the "action slot" method, as shown in the following figure, Nicole's action slot charging speed game is particularly fast, although the battle scene is a fixed perspective of the "turn-based" feeling, but through such a setting or shows "Nicole more maneuverable than Seth" this point.
In wargames, the maneuver value is reflected in the "number of grids that can be walked per turn",
In "Heroes Invincible 5", the concepts of "initiative" and "speed" are introduced, and the mobility ability of each class needs to be comprehensively viewed.
For example, the core of the simulation business game is "revenue" and "cost", taking "Dream Western Restaurant" as an example, more expensive furniture and better employees require higher costs.
But in the same way, it can bring a better experience to diners who come to your restaurant, and the specific performance of the game is that the chance of guests blowing up will be reduced, and more guests can be attracted. Assuming that the value of "income" is designed too low, and the "cost" value of senior employees and high-level furniture is designed too high, or there is a lack of suitable excessive options in the middle, then players are prone to fall into a long and boring "waiting period"; but if the "income" value is too high and the "cost" value is too low, it will cause players to unlock all options effortlessly, and then retreat tastelessly due to the lack of stage goals in the game.
In addition to the specific quantification of the series of dimensions mentioned above, the numerical rules also need to specify the upper and lower limits of the values of the relevant dimensions, such as the maximum damage value in the game, how much damage is reached at a time will be judged as a second kill (such as the world of Warcraft, a single time to bear too high damage can not be revived with the shaman's ancestor totem); how much damage can be reduced by defensive attributes, try to avoid units through brainless accumulation of defensive attributes to completely invalidate the attack of the attacker Whether there is an upper and lower limit on the movement speed of each unit, acceleration and deceleration should be avoided from evolving into displacement and fixation effects.
Third, the rules of physics
Fifa Soccer has always liked to use the physics engine of "smooth action, real impact" as a gimmick for its propaganda, and indeed in this series we can see that both the interaction between virtual players and football, or the confrontation between players and players, are becoming more and more realistic, close to the real world.
And in any game world, the physical rules for interacting with the world are very important. Let's start with the two early games, Pac-Man and Bomberman, which were born in 1980 and 1983. In the world of Pac-Man, the protagonist you control can only pan in four directions, up, down, left and right, and a route like ↗ this cannot be taken (more because of the limitations of the handle at that time), and secondly, the protagonist cannot cross the "wall", which is the figure surrounded by the blue wireframe shown in the following figure, and will be blocked if it does not turn and move after hitting the wall. But hostile "ghosts" can cross walls at certain times, which increases the difficulty of the game, which is the use of physics rules in early games. Bomberman also has a monster that can pass through the wall, and the protagonist can only pan up and down, left and right, but the wall in this game has a further distinction, some walls can be damaged by bombs, and even hidden useful props or portals to the next level.
From the above two games, we can see the three major contents of the physics rules brought by the early games———— need to stipulate the player's action mode, need to stipulate the player's interaction with the environment, and need to stipulate the interaction between the player and other units (or other players) (for example, these two games are hit by "ghosts" and directly lead to game over, but in "csgo" you hit the enemy during the move will only collide judgment, not cause damage). At present, many games like to use concepts such as "gravity" and "collision volume" to write about their physics engines when they are announced, but in fact, in the final analysis, they all revolve around the above three points. The "reasonable physical world" prevents characters from flying directly or being able to escape through walls for no reason, as do most of your enemies, as well as a reasonable explanation for your characters to be bleeding or even die after falling from heights or in certain circumstances (such as extreme cold and extreme heat).
But in addition, in the game is getting more and more realistic today, the game "environment and environment interaction" is also gradually valued, the most typical is the "City: Skyline" in a variety of natural disasters caused by the huge damage to the city, perhaps in the future technology further development of one day, we play the game will have "sudden temperature drop, the game began to snow, the ground becomes easy to slip" such an interesting random element appeared.
There are even games that have physics rules directly at the heart of the game, such as Poly Bridge, Balance Ball, and Portal. One is a simulated bridge building game that uses physical mechanics knowledge to build a vehicle that can reach its destination with the least amount of money; one is a puzzle game that solves various traps and mazes by moving three different material balls in the high-altitude maze; and the other is a first-person shooter game that uses space teleportation, opens the space entrance, and completes various puzzles.
The "through the wall" and "flying" functions of some game plug-ins are violations of the rules of game physics, and such plug-ins will feel more outrageous than "automatic targeting".
4. Reward Rules
In each game, the player will have a phased goal, and the producer will also make rules around these goals, such as "what is the way to achieve the goal" and "what is the reward for achieving the goal". Small objectives such as "You need to get xxx coins by fighting monsters, and then use these coins to buy a powerful piece of equipment", or "After successfully killing the final boss, the game will be completed, and the player will enjoy the achievement of completing the cg and completing the first level". Among them, "level cg", "achievement" and "purchase of equipment" are all goals and rewards, and "xxx gold coins needed" and "killing a certain boss" are the prerequisites for getting these goals and rewards stipulated in the rules of the game. Another super classic mechanic is the "Experience and Level" mechanic, which usually states that "after gaining x xp, the character's level increases". In single-player games you can break the rules of the game to some extent with modifiers, such as directly adding all the equipment to your backpack, or directly completing the level at the beginning stage, and so on.
Good reward rule design can fully stimulate the player's "greed", let them stay in the game non-stop "liver liver liver", "Bricks" and "Tetris" although there is no cool clearance CG and no complex equipment and level system, but with a simple point system can also make countless casual players enjoy.
But a poor or far lower-than-expected design will make players abandon the pit early in the game, such as the classic "Desert Bus" and "Kitano Takeshi's Challenge Book", after a thousand years of hard work, the former you will only get a pitiful 1 point, the latter Kitano Takeshi's game image will appear and ask you "What is the meaning of such a game?" "That feels terrible.
Many players have seen that the key to formulating the rules of the game reward is three points - whether the goal is clear; whether the complexity of the process is appropriate; and whether the feedback is in line with the player's expectations. Here's a look at some of the details commonly used in the game:
1. Use treasure chests and props to "lure" players into battle with additional enemies;
2. Provide players with clues to hidden treasures, such as "Alice: Crazy Return" designed in the "smaller" method to guide players to find hidden elements in the game.
3. Just like the ring in Sonic Kid Sonic, you can run the collection through the game level and let the collection guide the player's direction.
4. Let the player know what rewards and goals will be at the beginning of the game, which will facilitate them to develop a detailed strategy and list, and plan what they should do and how to do it in the game.
5. Through npc explanation and even demonstration, let players understand what specific effects will be given to the rewards they get. For example, in Half-Life, players will first hear rumors about a certain item from other NPCs, then players will see npCs holding and using this item, and finally players will get this new item, at this time they not only know what the name of the prop is, what it will have, and what effect it will have, but also be excited to get what they dream of.